Exodus 5:1

"And afterward Moses and Aaron came, and said unto Pharaoh, Thus saith Jehovah, the God of Israel, Let my people go, that they may hold a feast unto me in the wilderness."

No difficulty at all seems to have been encountered here by Moses and Aaron in their having ready access to Pharaoh. The reason very well could have been as suggested by Ellison: "The freedom Moses enjoyed is probably to be attributed to his having been adopted by Pharaoh's daughter."[3] If there were any difficulties, the sacred author ignored them. The proximity of Pharaoh's presence to the Israelites in Goshen (in the Delta area of northern Egypt) is seen as a problem to some who believe that the capital of Egypt in that period was located in the southern part of the kingdom, but the problem disappears in the fact that most of the capitals of kings in that period had more than one location, summer residences and winter residences of ruling monarchs being fairly common. The events of this chapter took place just after the harvest in May or June, and Pharaoh's summer palace was evidently in the vicinity of where Israel resided. Rawlinson placed the summer palace at Zoan (Tanis), and interpreted the word "afterward" (at the head of the chapter) as an indication that, "Moses and Aaron had to wait for the return of Pharaoh from his southern to his northern capital."[4]

"Let my people go, that they may hold a feast to me in the wilderness ..." There was nothing in that request that was the basis of any legitimate objection on Pharaoh's part. Work-journals belonging to overseers of employees in the times of the Pharaoh's listed, among other allowable reasons for absenteeism, "the offering of sacrifices by workmen to their gods."[5] There is visible in this first demand which God made of Pharaoh a definite mercy. By asking something that was legitimate enough, as presented, Pharaoh, had his heart been right, would have granted it. "Pharaoh could not have refused this request, if there had been a single trace of the fear of God in his heart."[6] This view is a far better explanation of the limitation of this first demand than the arrogant conclusion that this initial request was "a false pretext."[7] By refusing the first reasonable and lawful request, Pharaoh himself opened the door for all that followed.